We Arrived in Tanzania! New Experiences

Our safari to Tanzania had several "firsts" in our many safaris to East Africa. Everything went well at the Greenville airport—no body scans or searches. Once we got to Atlanta the adventure began. We boarded our plane on time. We started to taxi to the runway to take off. Then, the plane turned around and headed back to the terminal. The pilots explanation was, “oops, we did not receive a paper for the cargo that was added at the last minute.” Pilot again, “we are waiting on someone at the gate to move equipment and bring us the paper.” We were promised this would take only a few minutes. Then, after 45 minutes the pilot came on again, “our taxi to the runway, our return back to the gate, and our waiting burned a lot of fuel. We are waiting now for someone to add fuel.” We finally left a little over two hours late. Then, somewhere over the Atlantic, the reason for our delay changed, the pilot said, “due to adverse winds we were running late.” We were really surprised when we actually got to Amsterdam.

We were sure that we had missed our flight since our Atlanta plane arrived at the same time that our plane to Tanzania was departing. We were blessed with the beauty of snow in Amsterdam. Even the planes were covered in snow. The countryside was beautiful. Good news is that we barely made our plane. They were closing the door to the gate when we came huffing and puffing. We made it. They told us that our luggage probably would not make it. Hakuna matata we made the flight. Then, we sat for 3.5 hours at the gate waiting to be called to be de-iced. By the time we left Amsterdam, we were running about 4.5 hours late. Thank God for a phone that works internationally so that we could text Mpeli. We are still wondering why they could not load our luggage. The explanation was once the door was closed it was closed.

The pilot did a great job and made up an hour of time. We arrived in Dar Es Salaam around 2:30 AM on December 3. After filling out the lost luggage forms and confirming their delivery to Iringa, we met Mpeli. What a great sight to see his smiling face and begin our journey to Iringa. We jumped in the Ford Explorer (yes, same as my Ford Explorer) and began our safari to Iringa at 3 AM. The great news is that there are no traffic jams in Dar at 3 AM. It was a cool 80 degrees at 3 AM. So with windows rolled down and the sounds of Mpeli and us laughing, we headed off under a moon lit and starry sky.

We caught a snack of beef soup for Bonnie and Mpeli and goat soup for me in Morogoro. The real treat was when Mpeli told us about a new place for breakfast. We stopped at the Mikumi safari camp just off the road. What a great breakfast! To all our Tanzania partners, this will be our stopping place from now on. We enjoyed a quick great full breakfast while watching Elephants, giraffes, water hogs, Eland, antelope, café buffalo, baboons, monkeys, and zebra come to a waterhole for a drink. The only thing we did not see was a Simba. Kinda glad since there was no fence, no nothing between us and the water hole.

We arrived in Iringa by 2 PM. Due to construction we were delayed a little bit. But, we drove very slow from Dar to Morogoro.

Nothing compares to the welcome that you receive at Daily Bread Life children’s home. The children had made signs and a new song to welcome us. My name has been changed from Floyd to Froidy. Bonnie is still Bonnie. We brought our greetings from all of you our partners to the children. They have grown so much and many of them speak some English and except a few small ones understand English very well.

We had a momentary electrical blackout last night. This is a huge problem in Tanzania. They are having power sharing. mandatory roving blackouts. This has been going on in some areas for two weeks. This applies to every thing—factories, businesses, everyone has no power on a rotating basis.

This morning, we woke to see the tractor and plow at work in the field in front of the children’s home. By 7 AM people were coming wanting to hire the DBL tractor for plowing their fields. By, 9 AM already seven people were scheduled. This provides much needed financial resources for the children’s home. Money made from the tractor plowing helped to pay for one children’s broken arm to be set and “cemented” and for another child to get stitches for injuries received playing soccer. What had taken a month in the past took just a couple of day last week planting the Kidetete DBL farm because of the tractor. What a great blessing the tractor and plow are!

Bonnie began her unique assignment of teaching reproductive health and what the Bible says about sex. I promise more pictures by the time you wake up tomorrow morning and catching up the blog. Power outages have played havoc on trying to blog.

Monday morning I(Froidy) will begin my day at 6 AM gathering grass for the cattle. Bonnie renews her teaching at 9 AM. After that we head for Nzihi Children's Home. While Bonnie is teaching, I plan to catch up the blogs.